Mac Whitney's kinetic "Tioga" (foreground) can move with the wind. His works are on view at Gallery Sonja Roesch.

Mac Whitney's kinetic "Tioga" (foreground) can move with the wind. His works are on view at Gallery Sonja Roesch.

Photo: Molly Glentzer

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Works by sculptor Mac Whitney on view at Gallery Sonja Roesch through Feb. 23.

Works by sculptor Mac Whitney on view at Gallery Sonja Roesch through Feb. 23.

Photo: Gallery Sonja Roesch

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"Rosita" is among the works by sculptor Mac Whitney on view at Gallery Sonja Roesch through Feb. 23.

"Rosita" is among the works by sculptor Mac Whitney on view at Gallery Sonja Roesch through Feb. 23.

Photo: Gallery Sonja Roesch

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Mack Whitney's "Manzano" is among the works on view at Gallery Sonja Roesch through Feb. 23.

Mack Whitney's "Manzano" is among the works on view at Gallery Sonja Roesch through Feb. 23.

Photo: Gallery Sonja Roesch

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The fantastical miniature figures in Joshua Goode's "Origin of Myth" are made from plastic toys.

The fantastical miniature figures in Joshua Goode's "Origin of Myth" are made from plastic toys.

Photo: Darke Gallery

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Joshua Goode's "Origin of Myth" is on view at Darke Gallery through March 9.

Joshua Goode's "Origin of Myth" is on view at Darke Gallery through March 9.

Photo: Darke Gallery

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Joshua Goode's "Origin of Myth" is on view at Darke Gallery through March 9.

Joshua Goode's "Origin of Myth" is on view at Darke Gallery through March 9.

Photo: Darke Gallery

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Joshua Goode's "Chimera IV (Mummified Dinosaur Horse)" is among numerous small sculptures made of small toys on display in his solo exhibit, "Origin of Myth" at Darke Gallery through March 9.

Joshua Goode's "Chimera IV (Mummified Dinosaur Horse)" is among numerous small sculptures made of small toys on display in his solo exhibit, "Origin of Myth" at Darke Gallery through March 9.

Photo: Molly Glentzer

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The Dozer is a man (well, an action figure) with the head of a bulldozer.

The Dozer is a man (well, an action figure) with the head of a bulldozer.

Photo: Courtesy Joshua Goode

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Goode displays some of the artifacts as if they're still partially dug from his imaginary archaeological site.

Goode displays some of the artifacts as if they're still partially dug from his imaginary archaeological site.

Photo: Courtesy Joshua Goode

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Goode displays some of the artifacts as if they're still only partially dug from his imaginary archaological site.

Goode displays some of the artifacts as if they're still only partially dug from his imaginary archaological site.

Photo: Courtesy Joshua Goode

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"Origin of Myth" turns Darke Gallery into a natural history museum of small artifacts from the "Ancient Aurora Rhome civilization" dreamed up by artist Joshua Goode.

"Origin of Myth" turns Darke Gallery into a natural history museum of small artifacts from the "Ancient Aurora Rhome civilization" dreamed up by artist Joshua Goode.

Photo: Courtesy Joshua Goode

Paintings expand meaning of sculptures by Whitney and Goode

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From monumental to miniscule, form is functioning well in sculpture exhibits at Gallery Sonja Roesch and Darke Gallery. In both shows, the artists supplement their three-dimensional works with paintings that lead you further into their process and thinking.

Mac Whitney's "Houston," a 50,000-pound, 50-foot-tall abstract monument of red-painted steel at Stude Park, has been visible from Interstate 10 for about 30 years. One of the first public artworks commissioned by the city, it was completed in 1981 and installed in 1982.

Roesch was surprised last year to learn that Whitney, who is in his 70s and lives by himself on a ranch outside Dallas, wasn't represented by a Houston gallery. His 20-foot "Corrizozo" now grabs attention in the front yard of her Caroline Street gallery, and inside, she's displayed 11 smaller pieces and five paintings. (The exhibit ends Saturday, but the sculptures will remain on view on the back lawn.)

Most of the sculptures are from Whitney's recent "Linked" series: abstract objects ranging from 18 inches to 7 feet tall.

They seem intriguingly at odds with themselves, both free-form and painstakingly composed, delicate-looking but made of heavy steel. They involve, among other shapes, half-circles and triangles strung together intuitively in a chain, then tangled and righted to a balance point before they're welded into place and painted or powder-coated. Two of the sculptures, including the brushed stainless steel "Clebit" from 2001, are kinetic - designed to move in the wind.

Roesch likes the works' "internal power," she said, as well as the quality of Whitney's engineering and construction.

Many sculptors draw studies before they begin working with heavy material. Whitney is more intuitive, Roesch said, and his paintings are more like precursors. "He paints to free up his mind," she said.

Whitney's many-layered oil paintings, in the same family of reds, mustards and blacks as the sculptures, express similar ideas, without the limitation of gravity.

At Darke Gallery, Joshua Goode's witty solo show "Origin of Myth" is grounded in another world.

The gallery's winter artist in residence, Goode has created a miniature natural history museum of whimsical artifacts ostensibly unearthed from an ancient subterranean tomb at a site across the street where new townhomes now stand.

Goode has let his boyish imagination run wild, perhaps with an assist from his young daughter, in cutting up small molded-plastic action figures and reassembling them so their hind legs, say, might appear where a head should be. Painted gold and displayed under glass, the "artifacts" look slightly Etruscan, slightly sci-fi.

The fun multiplies if you take time to read the elaborate mythology Goode has created. Each figure holds a place in the pantheon of an "Ancient Aurora Rhome" civilization, a reference to the communities of Rhome and Aurora northwest of Fort Worth, where the artist, a sixth-generation Texan, grew up.

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A few of the works were shown in progress last year at Box 13, and Goode created another version of his museum two years ago in Cairo, Egypt, eventually donating that "dig" to a school for the blind.

The figures would be intriguing enough on their own, but the stories make you laugh - and ponder a bit.

For example, the war goddess Dinorse had her own cult. "There were so many dinosaur horse mummies created that at the end of the 19th century, a total of 19 tons of mummified dinosaur horses were shipped to England to be used as fertilizer," Goode writes.

Among the fascinating juxtapositions are the Dozer (a man with the head of a bulldozer), the Legorse (plastic horse meets cowboy legs) and the multiheaded rulers Jake and Betty Lou.

Several dozen "Auroran Miniatures" fill the walls, crude small paintings in the vein of illuminated manuscripts that Goode explains had their high point after the "traumatic Stray Mongrel Invasion." Oddly, the paintings seem dominated by skeletal figures rather than the gods and goddesses represented in the tiny sculptures.

Goode rightly sensed people would want to handle his toys; at one end of the gallery, visitors are invited to dig into a large case of salt, excavate more figures and help identify them.

The mood turns darker upstairs, where Goode portrays his daughter in large oil paintings whose harsh colors and shading give them a creepy attitude. The girl appears in various guises, such as a gun-toting cowgirl and a ghostly hooded figure.